Roger Moroney: I've forgotten what I was going to call this

Roger Moroney.

My father once gave me some great advice but I've forgotten what it was.

I had a good idea the other day but can't remember what it was, which is unfortunate because it was an idea for a column I thought might go down well.

It was something to do with something I saw but I can't remember what it was I saw, or where it was for that matter.

But at the time it seemed like a good idea, however, it was when I started to run it by someone a couple of days after it had first entered my mind that I realised I'd forgotten what it was.

It had started out promisingly enough.

"I had this great idea the other day," I said.

"It's one of those things that everyone talks about from time to time because it gets on their goat."

That's when it dissolved from whatever leaking sponge/scourer thing is ensconced in my skull under the misappropriated title of a brain.

"So?" my companion asked.

"What's the great idea then?"

I could only sit there tacit and mute for a few seconds trying to wring the sponge/scourer out in search of that great story idea ... whatever it was.

"I can't remember ... but it'll come back to me," was all I could muster.

The latter part of that excuse, the bit about "it'll come back to me" is I suspect one of the most commonly used phrases in existence.

Simply because everyone, at some stage of their lives, will forget something ... right at the moment they begin to tell someone about whatever it was.

I suspect age does have an input because while in conversation with other chaps of a "mature" age the "it'll come back to me" excuse is a frequent part of things.

"The other day I ran into that bloke who used to run that shop down ... down ... that street down Pandora where the ... the ... that place that sells those ... things they make for the ... the ..."

And so it sadly and incomprehensibly goes.

The usual reply is "you mean the bloke who used to own that place over by ... by the ... I think it was down by the railways lines ..."

To which you reply "no, I think you're thinking of old ... old ... oh, I can't remember his bloody name ... but he had a beard ... I think."

'Not the bloke who had that Vauxhall Victor ... or was it a Mk2 Zodiac?"

Someone else generally enters the fractured fray at that stage by saying if it was the bloke he thought it was then he used to have a motorbike.

"Did he run that service station down by ... down by ... no hang on, he was a wharfie wasn't he?"

The silence is generally then interrupted by the sound of several fingers scratching in frustration at several scalps.

Forgetting something is a well-worn human trait.

Now they say elephants have really good memories, which I suppose is not too surprising given the size of their heads ... their brains must be the size of the average chest of drawers.

Apparently anti-oxidants are good to enhance the memory cells.

Stuff like celery, cauliflower, curry, walnuts and broccoli.

Boil that lot up, sprinkle some chilli sauce over the top and you're sorted.

So what's the best thing to enhance the memory in terms of using the brain itself, in association with the stomach?

Well, a bloke who used to work in the psychological field told me once ... but I've forgotten what it was.

I think it had something to do with a growing a beard and buying a Vauxhall Victor.

No hang on, I've just opened the wrong portal in the old sponge/scourer.

I think it was do crosswords every seven minutes and eat carrots ... but not too many because you'll turn orange in a fortnight ... or was it three months?

I can't remember ... but it'll come back to me.

Herein lies one of the most treacherous aspects of that vile thing called the memory bank, and those locked deposit doors which will only open when they choose to.

Because that time is generally 3.28am while you are slumbering through semi-consciousness.

"That's right," you whisper to yourself.

"That's what it was."

Then, when the alarm goes off four hours later, you've forgotten again.

I was once told to get up and write it down ... which I tried once.

But I'd forgotten where I put the pen, so that was that.